RIM grew into one of the world's most valuable tech companies. The BlackBerry became the indispensable accessory of business executives, heads of state, and Hollywood celebrities - until iPhone and Android came along and spoiled the party. Today the company, which has been renamed, simply, BlackBerry, is burning through cash as sales keep falling. On Nov. 21, BlackBerry shares closed at just above $6, the lowest it's been in almost 15 years.

You're listing a list of features. A feature isn't useful if it's users don't use it.

People could actually use the features that it had. That's how it was better.

Oh, and it had a fully featured browser, allowing it to access regular websites, not just mini-sites made for WAP browsers. That one feature - access to the whole world wide web - made it more powerful than every other phone on the market at the time.